Winterfest 2012 – The Aftermath of the Apocalypse

On behalf of the Process and Delivery Management Romania team, I want to tell you a few words about our experience in organizing the best End of the World seen so far.

After being voted as organizers, it all started with a team brainstorming in order to determine what theme we wanted to use for the party, then, other few meetings began to shape things.

George was named responsible with organizing and planning the whole process. As Agile as we are, there is no such thing as a self organizing party. Everyone received some tasks, a deadline, and off we went.

One of the first challenges we faced was to find a club that would suit our needs. There were more options, and at the end of the day we were very happy with our choice. The services offered proved great, the location was beautiful, there was plenty of great food and drinks and, last but not least, the DJ and VJ were crucial to the success of the party and were great professionals.

Though a funny, but rather difficult task, choosing the appropriate decorations for the theme was one of the moments we enjoyed most, as everyone tried their best to come up with the wildest ideas.

Sorin had the great idea of combining the decorations with the Secret Santa event in order to make it more special. We had six planets aligned in one of the side room, symbolizing the rumored apocalyptical event associated with the 21st of December, and every person who signed up for Secret Santa was distributed to one of the planets where they would go and pick up their present.

A last minute decision was very welcome among all participants: we encouraged everyone to wear face and body painting. Most of them were enthusiastic about the idea, and it surely added a certain flavor to the party, which turned into a huge success!

All in all, the party was a success and people seemed to have a great time. I guess the Apocalypse wasn’t as bad as they said it would be, right?

We usually work on separate projects so we don’t interact much, but organizing the party was a great opportunity for us to work together, and spend some time as a team. That was something special.

Of course the party would not have been the same, hadn’t we had the help of colleagues from other departments.

We’d like to thank Oana S., Andrei P., Stefan G. and Thea N. for helping us set up the Winterfest website. Thanks Mihaela R. for helping with the organization and being part of our team. Thank you 1&1 Band for offering us another unforgettable show, and for creating an explosive atmosphere at the party!

In the end, a few words from some of the organizing team members, regarding what they most enjoyed in this experience and the party:

“I really liked the location we chose for the party, and the services they offered” Florian

“I enjoyed the close engagement of all the members of our team during the preparation meetings, and the amazing ideas we came up with” Adrian

“We are happy that everyone seemed to have a good time, and enjoyed the party. We also enjoyed having the chance to work together, as our usual duties are within other teams, trying to support them to achieve the business targets” Sorin